Talk:Talk pages project/Replying/2021/10

The team would value any thoughts and/or questions you have about this new tool for Replying to specific comments on talk pages.

Replied user named

I Swedish Wikipedia there is a suggestion to have the name of the user that is replied to (and who is pre-written in the dialogue) remaining when typing the answer. In the smaple below both 2nd and 3rdAnvändare have replied to 1stAnvändare:

Jag tycker den nya funktionen är bra. 1stAnvändare (diskussion) 1 apri1 2022 kl. 00.01 (CEST)

Ja, den är jättebra! 2ndAnvändare (diskussion) 1 apri1 2022 kl. 00.10 (CEST)

Du har fel. 3rdAnvändare (diskussion) 1 apri1 2022 kl. 00.11 (CEST)

This would make it clearer:

Jag tycker den nya funktionen är bra. 1stAnvändare (diskussion) 1 apri1 2022 kl. 00.01 (CEST)

1stAnvändare: Ja, den är jättebra! 2ndAnvändare (diskussion) 1 apri1 2022 kl. 00.10 (CEST)

1stAnvändare: Du har fel. 3rdAnvändare (diskussion) 1 apri1 2022 kl. 00.11 (CEST)

Personally I do not think it is required, but I am sure you have some rationale and hope you can share the descision. LittleGun (talk) 05:30, 1 October 2021 (UTC)

I don't think that would work when I'm not really replying to "the person". Imagine this in a more formal vote:

----

Shall we adopt this proposal? WhatamIdoing (talk) 14:00, 1 October 2021 (UTC)

WhatamIdoing: Support Example (talk) 18:00, 2 October 2021 (UTC)

WhatamIdoing: Oppose Editor (talk) 19:00, 3 October 2021 (UTC)

----It seems kind of silly to tell "me" about the votes. The votes are really intended for everyone. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 19:06, 8 October 2021 (UTC)

Bullets or similar for each reply

More feedback from Swedish Wikipedia (overall positive reactions by the way): As the intendation for new replies is strictly coded to what post it is replied to, including when there is a edit conflict, it has more often become harder to see where a reply ends and another starts, as no indentation is added. (To my experience most replies arent actual replies to posts, more of a general post on the subject in chronological order). A suggestion is to add some kind of bullet to each post. I guess this i not the first time this is suggested? LittleGun (talk) 13:44, 1 October 2021 (UTC)

The Russian Wikipedia uses bullet points as a "standard" (perhaps half the comments?) formatting method. The Reply tool isn't set up to handle that, but there are some Phab tickets. There's also a request to be able to manually change the "indentation" level (most commonly, back to zero for voting or ±1 for legibility/to overcome formatting problems). Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 20:16, 6 October 2021 (UTC)

How often do you encounter an edit conflict? Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 20:16, 6 October 2021 (UTC)

Quite often. Once a week or something. Mainly in heated discussions, and I am a lot involved in those. I still think it is easier with Reply Tool. After an edit conflict I just hit "edit" and add the colons, or move my post one step up and add colons to the conflictong edit (or just dont care). So not a big issue, for me. But it is hard to separate posts if they have the same indentation, and it do happen more with the reply tool. It is probably as intended by strict rules and intention. But as we dont really follow the strict rules and intentions we somtetimes are surptised. And one of the very few negative reactions have been according to this from a few users. I will check out ruWP, just to see how it may look. I really appreciate you swift answers in the feedback. Thanks! LittleGun (talk) 20:42, 6 October 2021 (UTC)

Minor formating bug

Minor bug or strange behaviour reported at Swedish Wikipedia, [1]:

When using <div>..</div> for formatting an entrance, also [answer] is formatted.

When using simplified formatting, such as '', [answer] is not formatted.

Maybe "bug" is a strong word. Some discrepancy anyway. LittleGun (talk) 05:04, 3 October 2021 (UTC)

I think this has been fixed now? I get a [reply] link at the end of that newsletter today. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 21:22, 10 November 2021 (UTC)

Preview issue on mobile browser

I’m a mobile user and on my web browser, the source editor version (which I prefer so I can use templates) is really a bear owing to the auto preview. Instead of the preview updating smoothly, the whole area (source code and preview) flashes each time the preview autoupdates (so, every few characters typed). The strobing effect is enough to give me a headache; I do wonder if it could pose even more serious issues for some users. In any case would be great if this could be smoothed out. Thanks much. Innisfree987 (talk) 00:45, 9 October 2021 (UTC)

Thank you for pointing out, and in my case, happens on iMac as well as I work on mobile mode instead of Desktop mode. Wish we would come up with any way strobing effect stops: At the moment, I find:

• To stop the strobing effect, I dismiss or close the clipboard to which I have copied word(s); and,
• I wait the flickering speeds down/manageable/slow enough for me to choose word(s) to copy to the clipboard;
• I can start working with clipboard again at that time.
• My iMac uses BigSur 11.6; Firefox for iOS ver.37. Omotecho (talk) 16:48, 9 October 2021 (UTC)

I'm sorry about this problem. Do you get this problem if you use Safe mode?

Also, please consider putting Talk pages project/Mobile on your watchlist (for the future – it currently says almost nothing). Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 20:01, 10 November 2021 (UTC)

@Whatamidoing (WMF), I have not tried safe_mode as my PHP knowledge is still to bud or comprehend codes. Thank you anyway pointing out. Cheers, Omotecho (talk) 01:15, 1 February 2022 (UTC)

If you would normally edit a page with this URL:

https://www.mediawiki.org/w/index.php?title=User:Whatamidoing_(WMF)/Sandbox&action=edit

then for "safe mode", you would use this URL:

https://www.mediawiki.org/w/index.php?title=User:Whatamidoing_(WMF)/Sandbox&action=edit&safemode=1

Please feel free to edit my sandbox, if you want to test it there. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 18:21, 2 February 2022 (UTC)

@Innisfree987 + @Omotecho: have you been able to reproduce the flickering/strobing issue while using the Reply and New Discussion Tools in Safe mode?

I ask the above as the Editing Team will soon start focusing on improving talk pages on mobile and I'd like to make sure we consider this issue as part of this work if it is still happening.

More information can be found about the work the Editing Team has planned for mobile talk pages here: Talk pages project/Mobile. PPelberg (WMF) (talk) 19:56, 31 January 2022 (UTC)

Issue when responding in a !vote that expects a bulleted list

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T259865

So I responded to the first comment in this conversation, and when I added a bullet ( *) it, instead pushed it one level deeper in the conversation. On many EnWiki talk pages this is a common charachteristic of conversations. Sadads (talk) 13:23, 9 October 2021 (UTC)

Translation

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

Hello, I just saw the reply button on Slovak wikipedia for the first time and wanted to try it, but the whole interface is in czech. It would be nice if it was in Slovak. If there is an option I can help translate from czech or english to slovak. Thanks - ~ Matroxko (talk) 11:22, 12 October 2021 (UTC)

Hi, the interface can be translated at translatewiki.net here: https://translatewiki.net/wiki/Special:Translate?action=translate&group=ext-discussiontools-user&language=sk&filter=%21translated

Thanks! Matma Rex (talk) 11:32, 12 October 2021 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Disabling autosign

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T278442

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T291421

With Enterprisey's reply-link, if you needed to sign before the end, you could, and the tool wouldn't sign again. I can't find a way to achieve that with this one. Is there? Usedtobecool (talk) 16:22, 13 October 2021 (UTC)

No, this cannot (currently) be done in this tool. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 20:03, 10 November 2021 (UTC)

I tried to start a new section on a users page and leave this templated message which itself autosigns the users' signature (I'm sure there must be many others in use) and ended up having one signature inside the intended space, as expected, but, then found a second one had been automatically added outside it by the fact that New Section was forcing the reply tool to be deployed.

I could way I could get around it was by using 'Edit source' to edit the entire page.

I was disappointed I couldn't find any way to still add a new section and turn off autosigning for that message. Nick Moyes (talk) 17:28, 31 December 2021 (UTC)

I am not sure that this feature will ever be implemented in this tool. It would probably be faster to update the template. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 01:11, 5 January 2022 (UTC)

Food for thought

Maybe it would interesting to read some of the features provided here for inspiration and food for thought for new upcoming features. I stumbled upon it randomly. But most likely the editing team is already aware of that script (assuming Jacky is not already part of the team himself :P ). Klein Muçi (talk) 10:42, 21 October 2021 (UTC)

The team has talked to Jack quite a bit. Jack and Enterprisey have both written scripts that were major inspirations for this work. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 20:22, 21 October 2021 (UTC)

Yeah I already knew about Enterprisey and his reply tool. Glad to read they've both been part of the collaborations. :) Klein Muçi (talk) 21:44, 21 October 2021 (UTC)

Does not work well with ┌─────────────────────────────────┘
and other templates

On Wiktionary I tried to reply to the first comment in a deep thread. Another editor had used the outdent template part way through the thread to push future replies to the left side. My reply was placed immediately before the template (diff), rather than at the end where I had intended. (Correction diff for clarity.) I have found a similar problem with Wiktionary's look template.

I don't know how possible this would be to fix, but it was a problem I noticed. ExcarnateSojourner (talk) 01:28, 22 October 2021 (UTC)

Thank you for the note, and especially for the "correction diff". It made clear what should have happened.

Do you remember which of the many [reply] buttons you clicked in that section? (If you remember, then giving me the time/date closest to it is probably the most efficient way to identify it.) Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 20:16, 10 November 2021 (UTC)

Yes, I clicked the very first one in the section (2021-10-05T11:39). ExcarnateSojourner (talk) 03:44, 22 November 2021 (UTC)

I think that was caused by the blank line, rather than the template. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 23:09, 20 December 2021 (UTC)

Do you mean the blank line immediately after the comment I replied to (the very first one in the section)? If so I've managed to reproduce the issue (diff, correction diff) without such a blank line. Or do you mean a blank line that I introduced in my reply? ExcarnateSojourner (talk) 01:33, 21 December 2021 (UTC)

(See wikt:en:User talk:Whatamidoing (WMF)#Test for where I was testing this.)

If you have

Comment

:Reply

::Reply 2

(<-- a blank line)

:Another reply (or anything else)

then the Reply tool assumes that the end of the discussion is at the end of the "list", i.e., just before the blank line.

In this case, if you remove the blank line, but keep the (local/enwiktionary) {{Outdent }} template, then I think that template functions as its own line break. I don't know how (or even whether) it's possible to change the template to not create this effect. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 22:15, 7 January 2022 (UTC)

Magic word to disable [ reply ] link

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T249293

A magic word might be needed to disable [ reply ] link on archived talk pages. By having [ reply ] links available on archived talk pages, users can easily reply to archived discussions that should not be edited further. I see some users using __NOEDITSECTION__ on their archived talk pages, I'd love to have the __NOREPLYLINK__, too. Thanks! Labdajiwa (talk) 05:00, 23 October 2021 (UTC)

+1, I would use this on voting pages. Comments and discussions on other peoples‘ votes are commonly directed to the talk page. MBq (talk) 19:53, 9 November 2021 (UTC)

+1 Strainu (talk) 10:28, 2 November 2021 (UTC)

The Editing team talked about this today, and we will probably get our wish (maybe even in the next couple of weeks). Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 20:05, 10 November 2021 (UTC)

User search improvements

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T295507

When mentioning a user, the tool makes it quite easy to find a user who has commented earlier in the discussion, but every so often I want to mention someone else, and the search suggestions returned for that are quite poor. It'd be nice if active users on the project were given priority over a doppelganger account blocked in 2010. Sdkb ^talk 18:45, 27 October 2021 (UTC)

The Editing team was talking about this recently. I think several suggestions have been made, including:

• Unblocked users > blocked users
• Active users > inactive users
• People who previously edited that talk page > people who have never edited that talk page

It might also be possible to use the search algorithms, which I believe emphasize the more popular pages (so if you type "Robin", you get suggestions of Robin, Robin Williams, and Robin Hood, rather than a purely alphabetical list). Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 20:43, 10 November 2021 (UTC)

Some of the potential problems are discussed in phab:T277357. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 20:46, 10 November 2021 (UTC)

Update: to make it easier to find the person you are wanting to ping, the usernames that appear within the Reply and New Discussion Tools' "username suggestion lists" is now limited to people who have made at least 1 edit to the wiki you are attempting to mention them on. More in phab:T294774. PPelberg (WMF) (talk) 19:50, 31 January 2022 (UTC)

That sounds like a good step forward! Sdkb ^talk 19:51, 31 January 2022 (UTC)

Tab order

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T295511

I believe it would be better if the tab order would favor the main workflow: From the editing window, jump to the buttons, then to Advanced and then to the links in the footer. Strainu (talk) 17:49, 30 October 2021 (UTC)

The current order is: edit box, advanced link, footer links, buttons. Strainu (talk) 17:49, 30 October 2021 (UTC)